Updated 9 April 2019
The inspection:
We carried out this inspection under Section 60 of the Health and Social Care Act 2008 (the Act) as part of our regulatory functions. This inspection was planned to check whether the provider was meeting the legal requirements and regulations associated with the Act, to look at the overall quality of the service, and to provide a rating for the service under the Care Act 2014.
Inspection team:
This inspection was completed by a single inspector.
Service and service type:
Priority Home Care is a domiciliary care agency. This service provides care and support to people living in their own homes.
Not everyone using Priority Home Care received a regulated activity; CQC only inspects the service being received by people provided with ‘personal care’; help with tasks related to personal hygiene and eating. Where they do we also take into account any wider social care provided.
The service had a manager registered with the Care Quality Commission. This means that they and the provider are legally responsible for how the service is run and for the quality and safety of the care provided.
Inspection site visit activity started on 12 March 2019 and ended on 14 March 2019. We visited the office location on the morning of 12 March 2019 and people in their homes in the afternoon. We returned to the office all day on 14 March 2019 to see the manager and office staff; and to review care records and policies and procedures.
Notice of inspection:
We gave the service 48 hours’ notice of the inspection visit so that people could be informed of our visit and permissions could be sought to arrange home visits.
What we did:
We reviewed information we had received about the service. This included details about incidents the provider must notify us about, such as abuse; and we sought feedback from the local authority and professionals who work with the service.
We visited five people’s homes and spoke with four people who used the service. We met with three relatives. We received feedback from two health and social care professionals via telephone.
We spoke with the registered manager and nominated individual. A Nominated Individual has overall responsibility for supervising the management of the service, and ensuring the quality of the services provided. We met with two carers and two senior carers. We reviewed four people’s care files, four Medicine Administration Records (MAR), policies, risk assessments, health and safety records, incident reporting, consent to care and treatment and quality audits. We looked at three staff files, the recruitment process, complaints, and training and supervision records.